Dr. Dave Donohue to Take Full-time Role at Delaware Psychiatric Center

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Beginning July 2019, I (Dr. Dave Donohue) will begin a new position at DPC.  I will retain a back-office role as Chief Medical Office (CMO) of Progressive Health of Delaware (PHOD), and will be present at many of our group-based programs.  In my new role, I will care for inpatients at the Delaware Psychiatric Center. My last day seeing patients in the daytime at PHOD will be Thursday June 27, 2019.

We are in the process of hiring my replacement.  As with our past hires, my replacement will be a thorough and conscientious practitioner, with strong skills in managing complex medical conditions and in lifestyle medicine.  If you already have an appointment scheduled, it will be switched to the new provider, whom I will help train.

I am very sorry for the inconvenience this presents to the many wonderful folks I have gotten to know since joining PHOD as a provider in 2004.  I greatly value having gotten to know you, and I will miss truly seeing you on a 1-on-1 basis.

Why am I leaving primary care?  Primary care has faced many pressures and I have been unable to purchase affordable health insurance for my family.  The state job at DPC carries excellent health benefits.

Our healthcare system rewards expensive sick care, such as inpatient medicine or coronary bypass surgery, but it discourages lower cost preventive measures like primary care or our Cure Diabetes program.  You can run such programs so long as you are willing (in my case) to earn at the bottom of your profession and go without real health insurance.

This does come at a time when primary care is undergoing change toward true prevention and value based care, which I welcome.  In the future we will be incentivized (it will actually be our job) to do what we at PHOD excel at: keeping people healthy and happy and not needing as many drugs, procedures, and hospitalizations.  PHOD will continue to be a leader in this field of disease reversal and cost containment in the Delaware region.

Financially however, the changes come too little, too late to prevent my departure from primary care.

As Chief Medical Officer at PHOD, I will continue to help set strategic direction for PHOD.  

  • I plan to attend most of our monthly Be Well programs (free, first Tuesday of the month, 6:30-8:30pm at the First Unitarian Church of Wilmington).  

  • I plan to continue to help deliver Cure Diabetes and other disease reversing programs.  

  • I will continue to create a set of handouts and algorithms, to assist with clinical workflows and Chronic Care Management at PHOD.

  • I may open some evening hours in the future.

  • For continuity, I will remain reachable through our Elation portal.

  • In October 2019, I will run Health Challenge Delaware, our free annual community health event. Sign up here!

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